Random News: Samurai Hearts and Zombie Rock

First of all, you may or may not have heard about an upcoming game called Lollipop Chainsaw. It’s the new title created by Grasshopper Manufacture. Sounds familiar? They, along with their head Sudo51, created the No More Heroes series. If you read BadassDemonlord’s review about No More Heroes 2 on this blog, you would know that we have a very bad view of this company. But doesn’t matter right now. What does matter is that Lollipop Chainsaw certainly looks interesting, following NMH’s trend of unique bosses. For now, the gameplay seems to be the same as NMH with a chainsaw taking place of the beam katana, but luckily without annyoing motion control it seems. Maybe Grasshopper gets their shit right this time, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

And yes, talking about bosses and back to the topic, a new trailer for this game was released, showing 4 bosses related to different styles of music: The Bosses of Zombie Rock. Zombies? Musicians? Chainsaws? Sign me up! (Just kidding, this will probably be another boring 6-hour button mashing game… but it does look interesting.)

Are you still here? Did I get your attention? Great. Now for something different: a new exhibition is now featured in the Smithsonian American Art Museum, called The Art of Video Games. From March 16th, 2012 to September 30th, 2012, visitors can take a look at the most important milestones in video game history.

Well… personally, I disagree with most of them. But as those games were decided by public vote, I can’t really blame anyone specific. Whatever. If you are interested, pay them a visit, or not, I don’t give a shit.

The next thing I would like to tell you about, is something that is very important to me, and if you are interested in good anime (japanese animation, in case you didn’t know), you should listen well.

Gintama is a series that has been running since 2003 (as a comic) and 2006 (a tv show) in Japan. 2010, a film was finally made, produced by Warner Bros., and it was a Japan-wide success. And February 2012, licensing company Sentai Filmworks finally announced, that they will bring the movie to the west, on both DVD and Blu-ray. Yay! This was huge news to me, as I love Gintama… But that is not all.

This past Saturday, Sentai Filmworks said they would also consider releasing the Gintama television series, depending on the sales of the movie. I was like “WHAT?!“

Now you may understand why I tell you all of this: I want to encourage you to check out the Gintama series, and if you are interested, to actually buy the movie. I know I’m asking for a lot with this, especially if you are not interested in anime in any way possible, but every possible support counts. Not for me, not for Sentai Filmworks, but to bring one of the best (if not the best) anime series ever created into our world. Don’t worry, this anime is not Naruto, it’s not Bleach, and it’s definitely not for kids. This is more like The Simpsons of Japan.

“What are you doing? It’s not like anyone would listen to you.”

The story revolves around a former samurai-hero with diabetes called Gintoki who has a lot of money, sweet temper and intelligent friends. He is to blame that Shinpachi, a plain guy with glasses, lost his job. So… he employs him, despite not having a real job himself. Just an Odd Jobs agency barely anybody knows. Later on he also employs Kagura, an alien girl with super human powers and an appetite bigger than the sun. Wait, did I mention that the world was invaded by aliens? Oh, right, the actual story. Shinpachi? Would you mind?

“The land of the samurai. There was a time, long ago, when our country was called by that name. With the arrival of alien creatures called Amanto from outer space, and the ban of sword usage twenty years ago, the people called samurai ceased to exist. in these hard times, there was one man left with the spirit of the samurai. His name was Ginto-

“Shut up already!”

Th- Thank you Kagura, I was afraid that he would take too long with the unimportant stuff… So, basically, this show is a comedy that knows no limits, but it has it’s serious (and bloody) parts as well (though most of it is comedy). The characters also break the fourth wall a lot, live in a high-tech society despite being set in the 18th-or-something century, due to alien influence, and cause nothing but trouble. And there are a lot of different characters, be it the police, a useless homeless guy, a wanted terrorist or even the leader of the nation, the shogun himself.

Interested yet? Don’t worry, I won’t bother you with details any more. Check it out, google it – you will probably find something – or just do whatever you want. I won’t force you into anything. You may also check out the pictures down below (read from left to right), they are yet another examples of the scenes from the TV series. Cheers!